Ghost Boyfriend

ancient

It's way worse than I remember.

The paint looks so dull and the windows has wiry, thick, black cobweb threads behind them. Mangy shrubs sprouting instead in the small curt garden along with the large wild garden gnomes. I survey the entire ghost-like building for a few minutes before turning to Mark. "I'm not sure anyone would live here. Is this really the place?"

I've been here before. In this same neighbourhood where they'd been bright and lively trees, kids roaming about, playing hopscotch or tango but now all I could see was withered trees and dead grasses. From a distance, a bird hoots and I grip the steering wheel in creeping fright.

Suddenly quiet, his eyes were drained of their youthful spark. He hovers beside me, hands clasped together like someone devoid of faith. Maybe this too wasn't how he remembered it.

"You're twenty-three right?" I say thoughtfully. Of course, he looks smaller and childish too but appearances lied sometimes.

He gasps and makes to swat my arm but just as always, it swishes through. "Ew, I'm not so old. I'm only eighteen,"

I scribble down on a notepad quickly, calculating. "So that means you were sixteen in the year 1974? Correct me if I'm wrong. Math's not my thing."

His eyes come alive as he shrieks. "Yes! Reece and I were dancing to karaoke in Le Par. Then we sat down to girls and sexed them up all night long. Gawd! That was divine, having chicks moaning, nails digging into the sheets behind their heads, yelling out - "

"Wait, wait hold up peeve," I hold up a hand, already bored with the details. "I simply asked if you were sixteen in 2007, not to start telling me about your s*x life."

"Well," he piques, visibly annoyed I'd cut him off. "You could have waited till I'm done. Yes, I was sixteen in 2007."

"That's great," I'm drawn to the window shuffling and a man's oblong head peeking out at me, his glasses askew and thin, dusty even. "Strange for someone this old to be living alone in this frightful place, don't you think Mark? He's spotted us now, Let's go."

I get out and made my way over to the front door, delivering a knock on it. "Hi?"

I'm guessing the man must be doing something really important for he took minutes to come down and when the door eventually swings open, a shorter woman was at his heels. Great, maybe it's his maid. She looks young, probably thirty or so and is wearing a dirty apron I never want to see again. "Yes? Looking for someone?" She asks tartly.

"Sorry to bother you. Does this happen to be Mark Jeppin's ancestral home?" I look back anxiously at Mark.

He's vanished!

Critters! I dart my eyes over to the car. Maybe the little urchin stayed back. Typical of him to abandon me with these people.

"Mark!" the lady's eyes soften and I can tell I've touched a soft spot as the man surges forth, his froggy eyes darkening with anger. "Who are you to speak of his name outside these walls?" now that he's close up, I feel intimidated by his bulk, muscles heaving dangerously. He'd knock me out in a daze if I'm so unlucky.

"I'm-I'm," I swallow hard. "I'm Peter Collins, his - "

"Peter?" the lady butts the man aside and pulls me into a hug. Quite energetic for someone thirty. "Come in! You're welcome. Forgive my initial ignorance, I just didn't recognize you. Look how big you've grown!"

Yup. She's a chatterbox too. Reminds me of Mom.

I follow her through a dusty old hall, wheezing my eyes out with my handkerchief proving itself incompetent in handling my situation. Behind, I feel the man's gaze drill holes into my back, maybe thinking up ways to murder or stab me. Gosh, Mark has such old-fashioned parents. Now that I remember well, I'd never met them or come here before. It'd been planned out and we were set to leave the next day when I ended up with a stubborn cold, plus a blinding headache so he cancelled the trip to take care of me. He was such a sweet pie.

The whole place is quiet, apart from the rattling windows and shadows dancing in the encroaching darkness. I should feel scared as we curve to an open space with giant pots on wide berths of fire. What if it's all a lie and Mark's parents are dead? What if these two were spirits and leading me to the sacrificial altar to offer a god my soul? What if they steam my head? Chop my brain to bits or boil me up whole? Goodness! I should have thought this through. I'm too young to die. I've not even found true love yet.

The lady enters a room where a couple of baldy old men are dozing, cups sputtered all over and baked bread growing cold in stainless plates. She kicks one who murmurs incoherently and whiffs out in command. "Get them out of here Chris,"

I look back to Chris who's now shoving them out. She gestures me to a patio with two teacups and a saucer of sausages on a table. Scooting a chair back, I sink my butt to dusty old leather. "It's so nice of you to come to see us after all. At first, we thought you didn't show up because you loathed Mark or you two didn't get along before his death."

"Mark and I broke up before the accident," I bit my bottom lip nervously when Chris rests his bulk against the doorframe, casting his froggy eyes upon us. "We were so young and vulnerable, never able to handle things properly. At his demise, the press had themselves all over me, stylishly posing questions that would play me out as his murderer. If it hadn't been for my parents, I wouldn't have survived it. I'd have gone to jail."

"Must have been terrible for you," she's pouring herself a cup of tea. "Mark was on his way to Virginia that morning, on an urgent errand to deliver a priceless jewel belonging to my eldest sister, Hinny. It's a family heirloom we hoped to sell off but by noon, we had no phone call from either of them. When we turn up the telly to watch the six o'clock news channel, there was our Mark, head on the wheel, blood oozing out. He'd died a few hours as the autopsy confirmed. None of us has been the same ever since."

"And the jewel?" I'm leaning forward with growing interest. "How expensive is it? Did the police find it in the shambles? Is there a chance he was murdered?" okay, the last question may be a long shot but what the hell gives at this point?

All I had to do was milk them dry of any information concerning the murder and report back to Mark. After that, we'd find clues.

She brought the dainty white cup to her lips and took a cautious sip. "No one came up with anything from the car which was wrecked to bits and he was murdered all right," she shakes her head, sadness flashed across her features. "But it was done smartly. Made to look like an accident."

"Do you suspect anyone holding a grudge against him so much as to wish to kill him? Do your family have any mortal enemies who'd do this? Was it because of the jewel he was attacked?" I'm sweating buckets, looking on at both of them anxiously. "Please tell me. I want to help you. " if I'm to report anything back to that snotty ghost, it's got to be reasonable at least to satisfy him, not that he's ever satisfied.

"You tell us. He was your boyfriend after all. You're supposed to know him more." the man pipes in. "It was certainly no one we know of and I'm sure he has a rival, someone out to bring him down. The jewel ain't the case here."

Ignoring the sudden foreboding, which meant ignoring the man too, I turn to whiff at Mrs Chris. "He had no mortal enemies in school. Mark was loved and adored by us all."

Doubtful glances are exchanged and I drag a palm down my face. "What the butt? You don't believe me?"

"He argued with someone the night before he was to go to Virginia. It was Reece Heth - "

"Heveaner!" I croak in excitement, then coloured. "I remember him."

Damn right I did, I mean how can I forget my first kiss?

We'd met at a pub when I'd not met Mag or Mark yet. He sat not too far away, staring at me intensely as I hiphoped to the heavy metal streaming out the jukebox at Tweets. We hooked up that night and I committed my first-ever sin of f*********n.

Not to bother, I've been sinning practically all my life, if you know what I mean.

"They had a long conversation, and it was not friendly." she took a long sip off her cup this time, the steam from the liquid staining her cheeks pink. "Now if you know him, I'm sure you can take things up from there."

I feel my lips pulling up to a smile as I see myself as a potential solver for this mystery. Yes! I'll call Reece and demand to hold an interview with him where I hope to sniff out all the deets from him. It can't be that hard right? I can handle this. I'm twenty and I'm very mature. So why do I feel nervous when I slick off my cell to dial him on my way back to the car? Why isn't he answering?

Shit! I glance down at my screen in horror I've been dialling Mom!!